Revised Standards Released for Counseling Services

The Council for the Advancement of Standards in Higher Education (CAS) is pleased to announce the release of a revised set of standards for Counseling Services.

CAS, a consortium composed of over 40 collaborating professional associations representing over 115,000 professionals in higher education, has developed standards for 47 functional areas and 3 cross-functional teams, and rooted them in the scholarship and work conducted within their respective fields. These revised standards delineate expectations for practitioners and educators in related functional areas, and are an update to the standards published in the 2019 CAS Professional Standards for Higher Education (10th ed).

The CAS revision committee was chaired by Ann Knettler, Coordinator of Student Accessibility Services at Delaware State University and a CAS Representative from the Association on Higher Education And Disability (AHEAD). Knettler noted the significance of the revised standards as they provide a timely and relevant update to reflect the technological and legal standards of a 21st Century Counseling Services program.&‹ The standards reflect additional clarification with regard to the relationship between Counseling Services and crisis response, outreach, clinical case management, conduct, consultation with stakeholders, and training expectations for Counseling Services professionals.

CAS partnered closely with experts from the American College Counseling Association (ACCA) in the revision of these standards. Perry Francis, Professor of Counseling & Coordinator of the College of Education Counseling Training Clinic at Eastern Michigan University and a CAS Representative from the American College Counseling Association (ACCA), provided expert guidance to the group in identifying relevant literature, trends, practice recommendations, and standards of good practice in counseling services. Francis was joined a team of experts including Jane Clement (University of Memphis), Josh Gunn (Kennesaw State University), Raime Thibodeaux (McNeese State University), and Kyle Bishop (St. Mary's College).

Knettler and Francis were joined by a multidisciplinary team of other CAS representatives including Nina Critz (HECMA, James Madison University), Joann Ng Hartmann (NAFSA), and Andy Milton (NIRSA, St. Ambrose University).

CAS is proud to release this revised set of standards for an important and evolving functional area in higher education.

The new standards for Counseling Services are now available at:
https://www.cas.edu/store_product.asp?prodid=133

An accompanying Self-Assessment Guide (SAG) is available at:
https://www.cas.edu/store_product.asp?prodid=54

Please direct all questions and inquiries about the revised standards to the CAS Executive Director ([email protected]).